Snuffy and Grommice - The Kindness of Strangers

A little over a week ago, I know you can cast your enormous brains back that far, I wrote a little post about the demise of our lovely little grey silkie Edna. And because you have a memory like a steel trap, you'd remember that Edna was taken way before her time by a local dog, and I was feeling a little upset about it.

Well, not two nights later, I received this email:

Hi Ali  I have followed your blog quietly for a little while now and I just read about what happened to your (and your boys) silkie chook, Edna. I know the feeling of losing your animals to something out of your control.   I breed silkies - I have nearly 80 black, white and buff ones (only a couple of these). I would like to give your boys a silkie pullet each, maybe a black one and a white one (or two black or two white if you prefer). Silkies are such the perfect chook for kids and so pretty in the garden.

M.

M was right, they are pretty, aren't they?

Today, M's husband went out of his way en route to the airport to hand over a box to Felix and I... and inside that box were our two lovely new little silkies whom the boys promptly named Snuffy and Grommice.

They are currently settling in beautifully with our gorgeous grown up chickens, and tonight will meet our cute little baby leghorns and australorps. We have chickens coming out of our ears now.

I am not very gifted with words, and I would love to have the ability to wax lyrical about M and her kindness and thoughtfulness. I'd love to say marvelous things about her generosity of spirit that led her to offer a gift to a person she had never even spoken to, let alone met. I'd love to write beautiful words about how acts like these gives me great hope and faith in humanity, but I really am not gifted with words, and I'd just end up sounding a bit soppy really.

What I am quite confident of saying though, is thank you.

To M and her husband from Sliprail, a HUGE thank you from Ali, Luka, and Felix. We adore our new little ladies.

Garden Sorrel

Move over Tatsoi - I have a new new favourite.

This, my beautiful blogging friends, is Garden Sorrel. Although why garden has to be specified is beyond me. Is there Bedroom Sorrel? Beach Sorrel? Are there places that I should be putting all kinds of appropriately named sorrel?

Oh, once again I digress.

Until this year, I had not ever, ever, ever tasted sorrel. And now that I have, I will never let it not be growing in my garden. I will shade it in summer and put a doona over it in winter. Because, my fabulous looking friends, sorrel (the kind you put in the garden) is To Die For. Delicious. Scrumptious would not be too strong a word to describe it. Like a leafy lemon lollie.

Garden Sorrel, you are my new new favourite.

Although I'd really love to try some of that Bedroom Sorrel.

Fenally

You would be forgiven for thinking that I had dropped off the screen of the blogaverse for all the non posting I have been doing lately, but I assure you, I am still around. It's been raining which is wonderful, but water bucketing down from the sky is fairly non conducive to taking the camera outside. Very good for filling the tank up though, and I now have 3000 fabulous liquid gold litres to play with.

Apart from the rain, we have just been busy. And I haven't felt like taking photographs. I have felt like sewing and planting and buying new couches, and, as it happens, plush elephants.

This elephant was such a hit that he earned a place at the dinner table this evening, and apparently tonight I am sewing him a new jacket. Can't wait to see that happening, his measurements are not exactly catered for in your average Butterick pattern.

Although as far as I am concerned, he can sit unclad at the dinner table every night. He's got marvelous manners and never interrupts.

With all the lovely rain we have had, and then the glorious sunshine today, the garden is practically growing in front of us... so many fabulous things to share, and today I thought I'd show off my new fennel (hence the post title... I was trying to be witty.. trying). I put it in ages ago after Phoebe from Ballynoe Cottage said she'd be interested to see how it would go here.

Well, it took a long time to germinate (months in fact), but this is how it's going.

Fare fabulously fair fennel.

Winter Wednesdays - It's Slightly Weird, But...

It's absolutely my favourite thing about winter. No contest, hands down.

Forget the lovely winter vegetables that do so well here, the tomatoes and the peas and cauliflower... forget the bananas that ripened, forget the glorious winter skies, the warm, sunny days, the crisp, fresh mornings and the clear, clean air... oh no, what I like most about winter

Is my hair.

Yes, my hair.

For three months of the year, with the fabulous lack of humidity here, a lack which peels the lips off your face and eczemas up the nation, my hair responds with soft waves and loose curls.

It is literally unable to frizz.

My winter days are lit with delight and joy, as I brush with abandon, confident in the knowledge that in a season where there is no humidity, there is no frizz.

It may seem like a small thing to you, but ordinarily I have the kind of hair, which if I were in a movie, would be teamed with bad glasses, freckles and braces.

No, winter is truly a kind friend to my hair.

Oh winter hair, how I will miss thee.

Here's linking up to Hazel for the last of the Winter Wednesdays for 2011. And good on you Hazel for kicking us in our cyber butts and making us appreciate that which we (me) do not normally appreciate.

ps can I ask why it is the last one? Isn't there one more Wednesday of Winter left? I am asking in my small voice (you have to imagine that my voice is small, it seems that I cannot change my font size today) just in case I really have no idea of when seasons start and finish. Which I normally don't, I mean it's either hot or cold, wet or dry here. Or, as it was today, hot and cold and wet. Yes, all at once.

If You Want Something Done Properly...

Then do it yourself...

Despite having a perfectly adequate nesting box, filled with lovely sugar cane mulch and comfortably placed under shelter, the chickens decided it wasn't quite right, and made their own.

And to be honest, I kind of agree with them. My humble attempt at a nesting box (not pictured!) is clearly just a wooden drawer filled with sugar cane mulch... whereas this... this is one well thought out, well made, cosy egg laying cocoon.

The ladies obviously wanted it done properly...

And did it themselves...

Which brings me to doing something else properly.

These photos of the boys with our lovely little silkie Edna were taken around a year ago. Edna was by far our favourite chicken. She was funny (when she walked her little head had to bob back and forth in time), gentle, and sweet. She laid lovely little eggs that the boys both coveted, and was just a delightful little creature to have around.

It was with great sadness that a few weeks ago our little Edna was taken by a dog that lives a few houses away from us.

I was very sad about Edna. In the grand scheme of things I know she was just a chicken, but she was my responsibility and most certainly didn't deserve to die such an undignified death.

So this is a proper little tribute to Edna, our funny little head-bobbing lady.

Before and After

I was going to entitle this post "This is my Angry Face", but my angry face was way too scary to let loose on the World Wide Web.Last week, this was my gorgeous mulberry tree. Not even in the ground for a year yet, and on to its second fruiting. I was so proud.
And this is my mulberry tree this week. It took one night and something, I suspect either a rat or a possum, has stripped it bare. Every single mulberry gone.
Oh sorry, I lie. There's half a one left here.

Every time I walk past it, my angry face gets a good workout.

Winter Wednesdays - A Heart in Winter

Or rather no heart in winter... Cabbages are a first for me this season, and I am unsure of their hearting habits...
This one doesn't seem to actually have one.

Is that a problem?

It's almost over - here's linking up to Hazel's Winter Wednesdays.... oh I can't wait to get to Hazel's Sunny Summer Sundays!

Cheep Thrills

Our family is very lucky in that just up the road from where we live, there is the most fabulous produce barn In The World.

Now it's not fabulous because of its shiny displays or its fabulous range, quite the opposite, it's a little haphazard and most of the interesting things you would want to buy display a large Not For Sale sign.

No, its marvelousness is in what it isn't as much as what it is. It's not modern or fancy or polished. It's old and full of character and a somewhat smelly charm. They have heaps of animals there (most of which are Not For Sale) - a shetland stallion, an enormous sow called Elvis, talking cockatoos, goats, guinea pigs, rats, ducks, and chickens. Loads of chickens, fancy ones and plain ones and funny ones. Oh and birds, peacocks and doves and all sorts of things that I try not to look at because some things just don't belong in a cage at all.

And the people who work there... I don't know where they are from, but I suspect they are all family, because there is young and old and each and every one of them has character. And kindness. They give the boys hay to feed to the goats and Elvis, let them nurse the baby animals, and even let me cuddle the cutest little baby pig EVER.

Well anyway, enough blather. The boys and I went there yesterday, and we bought baby chicks.

Two white Leghorns and two black Australorps.

Evie, Charlie, Batman and Lulu, welcome to our world.

Oh, and the post title. As we were leaving the produce barn with our chicks in a box, one of the guys who worked there said, "Chicks going cheap". "Oh yes," I replied earnestly, "I got them for such a good price, aren't they cute?"

What a numbnut.

Aspiring to Asparagus

I must have taken around 60 photos of our emerging asparagus, but try as I might, I couldn't quite manage to capture the detail the way I would have like to.
I had to settle for this photo, at least you can tell that it's asparagus... I think! The emerging shoots are really slender, and the camera just couldn't quite focus on them properly. Let's hope they fatten up a bit for a good photo.

So... asparagus. This is Mary Washington, and I have exactly 18 of them. And not really a good idea of where to put them. I am not sure how much their success will be assured here in Brisbane, after hours and hours of googling I did notice that poor Mary doesn't necessarily fare so well outside her preferred temperate zone.

But the seeds have sprouted and that seems to me a fortuitous beginning, and onwards I shall press on. Ha, plant on.

So... full sun? Dappled shade? Morning sun? Afternoon sun? Winter full sun and summer dappled? You name it, I can offer it.

The question is, what would Mary want?

Surely Yes...

The avocado tree is driving me batty... surely, but surely, these are flower buds on it?

A few weeks ago I showed you these photos, and there was no question in my mind that my avocado tree was on the verge of flowering.

But there was just one comment, just one, that asked me if I was sure they were flower buds and not just new leaf buds... and it started up a little niggling uncertainty in my mind.

I look at them every single day, and with every single sighting I change my mind.

Today, I am convinced in favour of flower buds. 100% sure for the moment.

Do you think??

Winter Wednesdays - It's So Over...

Yep, 21 degrees here today.

Toasty.

I think the chickens are celebrating an advanced, albeit unofficial end to winter here, because these lovely eggs are a sight I haven't seen in months.

I haven't taken a jumper to work for over a week now, and I am pretty sure that this afternoon I almost complained about how hot is was in my room at work. Almost. Winter has left the building.

Do you know what is bizarre though?

Being further north it is of course warmer here in Brisbane during the day than Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide But strangely, colder at night.

Take tomorrow for example:

Brisbane 22 high 4 low

Sydney 18 high 13 low

Melbourne 15 high (is that actually high?? :D) 11 low

Adelaide 18 high 8 low

How do you explain that?

Oops I almost forgot to link up. Here's to Hazel's Winter Wednesdays.

Determinate, Indeterminate or Just Plain Determined?

Until this year, I had no idea that different tomatoes had different growing habits.

Tomatoes always just seemed to pop up by themselves, offer up little red packages of delight, and then fade away. Since having read about determinate and indeterminate, however, I set out to examine a tomato plant in my front garden that is working its way up a hedge, determined to determine its terminability.

Armed with the knowledge that indeterminate tomatoes will continue to produce and grow until they are killed by external factors such as frost (good luck with that here), while determinate will stop growing once they reach a certain size, ripen all their crop at once and then die, I have concluded that pictured is a determined indeterminate tomato.

Credit where credit is due, I first read about the different types of tomatoes at Mark's Veg Plot.

New Wave Gardening

I am not entirely sure what New Wave Gardening might actually be, but if you take New Wave to signify experimental, then this is it for me.

For some time now I have been struggling with our dry season. In many parts our yard is a dustbowl, and the parts that aren't need constant watering. With only a 3000 litre tank, it just isn't possible to keep up, and so many things miss out.

A few weeks ago, you might remember that I mulched the front yard. Well popping up everywhere in that mulch now are lovely little pumpkin seedlings. Heaps of them. There are also a few tomatoes, and an eggplant, all from under a thick layer of mulch. And I have noticed something about these vegies that have appeared, unbidden, in the garden. None of them droop in the hot weather. Under their protective layer of mulch, their roots are cool and moist.

And this my friends, set off a light bulb in my small yet still functioning brain.

I have always mulched, but never on a grand scale. I have always been too chicken to get rid of the grass, everyone has grass, we have always had grass!

Well not anymore. Today I spread a thick layer of sugar cane mulch, followed by a layer of aged cow manure, and topped it all off with a lovely thick doona of red cypress mulch.

In the corner so far I have Black Zucchini, a few pop up tomatoes, Golden Bantam Corn, celery, broccoli and rainbow silverbeet. And I am thinking of lots more corn, some cucumber, a few more zucchini and perhaps a few sunflowers.

I'm not sure how much it will cut down on watering, or how well it will work, but anything is better than half dead grass and dust.

I feel like I have tucked up the vegies in a lovely comfy bed.

My New Favourite

Well winter countdown counters can say what they like, but the cold has most definitely lost its grip in Brisbane...

So much so, that I, a great one for living on the edge, went to work for once not only without my heater, but also without a jumper.

Yep, that's me, spontaneous, carefree and unpredictable. You can't predict me.

Anyway, blather once again aside, during the day here it is starting To Get Hot. And of course, it's only going to get hotter. Much hotter. Scorchingly hot in fact. Unbelievably scorching hot to the point where the radio broadcasts warnings as to how long you can spend outside before you start to burn.

Around 30 seconds for my pasty limbs.

Having not at all managed to put blather aside back there, I will now come to the point: I have to tell you how fabulous this lovely little asian green is before it is fried out of its bed.

Tatsoi. It is fabulous. Absolutely fabulous. It takes no time at all to grow from seed to seedling, it copes marvelously well without being watered every day, and it tastes wonderful. I have around 30 plants which have kept me in salad greens for months now.

Tatsoi, you are my new favourite in the garden. May you not bolt for months to come.

Winter Wednesdays - The First of the Broccoli and I Did A Bad Thing

I used town water to hose the garden.
I know, it's very bad. I am bad, it was bad, bad, bad, bad. But this week I am working full time, and when I got home today it was getting dark and there just wasn't time to lug around the watering can that I have been using as I drain off the dregs of the water tank. It hasn't rained here in weeks, and after a hot day today, it was either give the vegetables a drink or watch them die.

So I connected the hose to the town water tap, set it to shower, and I gave the poor wilting vegies the bath of their life. Honestly, you could see them coming back to life as the water got to their roots, and my satisfaction level with life reached new heights.

I am not exactly sure if it's legal to use the hose to water the garden at the moment, and I felt a little lot guilty, so I sent the boys to bed tonight without a bath, and I am going to forgo my shower. Euwwwwwww!

I am so going to pay for all this on my next water bill.

Bring on summer and the wet season.

Here's linking up to Hazel's Winter Wednesdays.

Australian Wildlife...

Pomodoro Mud Pie: Brick Red

Yep, that's right, I have invented my own tomato.

Amazering hey?

Oh, why did I call it Brick Red, you ask? Because it's red? Because it looks fabulously delicious and oh so good?

Oh no, no, please, let me explain.
I called this tomato Brick Red, this tomato that I have been excited about since way back in June, this tomato that I have been checking for ripeness and bugs every single day for over two months, well I call it Brick Red because this tomato, this one I am calling Brick Red, is as hard as a brick.

No kidding. You could take someone down by throwing Brick Red at them. You could lay it down as a house foundation.

Brick Red is as solid as a rock.

I thought that letting it ripen might soften it up a bit, but oh no, one week on and it's solid. I even gave it a little friend in the hopes that it would thaw its frozen core, but no, Brick Red has impenetrable as its middle name.

How fabulous that we are renovating the kitchen - Brick Red will come in so handy as a hammer.